The best I can do is say that I’m still working on a new album. Perhaps I’ll end up using it to try to recruit band mates . But I say that every time I’m about to release an album . smiles .
I think about why it’s so hard for me to start a band a lot . I’m overly picky and I don’t try hard enough. I haven’t played a show in 10 months and I feel kinda sick about it . I’ve done tons of music stuff in that time , mostly in a circular kind of way though . I ended up writing a bunch and re writing and loosing songs and rebuilding them .
To be honest and positive though , I did make one small step towards building a band . Jeff Halley and I started a little thing called Verser . We had a drummer for about a month and then he quit . smiles . I guess we’ll be looking for another drummer .
Here is a list of gifts* I’m looking for :
A drummer for a new project I’m doing called Verser (demos soon)
A second drummer for a new project I’m doing called Verser (demos soon)
A guitarist for Old And Gray
A second guitar player for Old And Gray
A drummer for Old And Gray
A sound person / effects controller for Old And Gray
I had an idea for a band today. Actually, it was an idea for two bands.
I want to start 2 bands. Band A and band B. Where:
band A writes the songs for band B
and band B writes the songs for band A
The bands would play together every show. They would either transition into each others sets perfectly OR they would play with performance artists between their sets.
They would play a show a month and release 2 albums a year for at least 2 years.
i walked through the door and couldn’t see passed my own nose.
it smelled sour. like lemony men.
i sat and stretched and watched as tiny bodies of water formed all over my body.
im not exactly sure how it happened, but the pools gathered , and somehow figured out a way to tun upwards through space and into my nose.
burning my lips and nostrils .
my eyes acclimated to the fog and i noticed a man laying on his back , on the side of the room .
he was moaning freely , and when i asked his if he was okay he informed me that PG&E rear ended him while he was on his chopper . i told him it smelled like money and some blurry hunching figure in the corner laughed. he continued to let me know while leaving the room that it would take more then that put get rid of him , at one point he had even taken a bullet through the cheek .
I saw a jazz concert the other day at the Jazz School in Berkeley . Their was this lady on piano, she was wearing mismatched shoes . I could only see the back of her head .
Her name was probably Sue Jewel . She was kinda sparkly .
At one point in the middle of the performance she was forced to play a solo in some key that I don’t think anyone in the crowd (or the band) was prepared for. In the middle of her solo, it was evident that she was lost, and I watched her stand up and lay down on the keys and wriggle around like a fast motion worm, kinda like a jump rope . she bit the piano multiple times and left saw dust in her wake.
Her grand finale was a vocal treat where she sang about pink clouds and being on earth simply for the reason “to love”. After hearing her voice, I think her name was actually Shelly Duval.
If you read this , and you’re the person i’m talking about , post a missed connection on craigslist and i’ll respond to you .
Its hard to fathom why we live in an age without a traveling dump . instead of burning oil and precious fossile fuels to move garbage trucks all over every single city in the entire world . . . we should just have one big glorious floating dump . i’ve designed a huge thing that floats through the air and comes to your house and collects your garbage . it doesn’t land , it doesn’t park outside your house and wake you up in the morning , it simply floats near you and sucks your garbage up into the air and into its core . (its naturally sticky and slimy and can do pretty much anything it wants) it also will perform its patented dump suck on you if you have been a bad person . so its kinda like santa , but its garbage .
I’ve been practicing only looking in two directions when i walk around,
1) straight ahead and directly into the sun .
2) down at the cement .
looking straight ahead and into the sun helps me not make a scrunched facial expression trying to shield my eyes from the brightness . at the same time , it makes my eyes water , but i prefer that .
looking at the cement has brought me to an interesting game . the Berkeley bobby pin project . I’m going to start collecting bobby pins that have been lost , to see how many i can find on a given day . Im doing this with the hope that i’ll help reunite the found bobby pins with their lost owners . It has become very evident that a large percent of the bobby pin population must have an aversion to being stuck on your head, day in and day out . And odds are , i’ve found the bobby pin that jumped off your head . Yesterday , i found soo many . like 8 . and the day before i found about 5, but i lost one in a swimming pool, and today, i found 3. Tomorrow i will find 10 . And i’ll come to realize that the berkeley bobby pin project is maybe a bit more dangerous then i originally thought. (more on this later)
In any event , I’m going to keep this up until all the Berkeley Bobby Pins are back on their rightful heads, holding wild hair where it should be.
If any of the Bobby Pins in any of the images you see look familiar, let me know and i’ll coordinate a time with you to see if it runs back to you when you call it by its name .
The sum of things that i experienced today are kinda hard to express neatly .
But today was entirely grand . . . no doubt about it .
I stumbled into a gathering of pipe organ enthusiasts all packed into a huge church yard. They all sat around and shared stories about amazing organ concerts they’ve seen and heard, about their ideas on modifying pianos to have foot pedals, about the history of pipe organs and how the first known pipe organ had 11,000 pipes, all made of wood . . . and built by hand. The sun was setting and i couldn’t help but smile a little .
Previously , the idea came into my mind to create a series of short stories based on experiences in a locker room .
I forgot how funny locker rooms are until today when i saw a man with a birthmark on his buttock . This normally wouldn’t make me think twice , but it turned out it was the same exact shape and size as a birthmark i have on my back. I went up and showed him my birthmark and told him it was just like his , and now we’re friends for life .
I didn’t expect to be visited by my father today , but he showed up none the less , even though its mothers day . i met him on Berkeley’s campus . he was just sitting in a field , using a funny accent , a lisp of sorts . but it didn’t trick me and i knew it was him , so he gave up and walked away soon after telling me
“you have to keep inventing things . it doesn’t matter if you’re 70 or 100 , thats what keeps you going .”
Recently i encountered the biggest daddy longlegs (presumably) in the world. It was about 2 feet tall , and about 3 feet wide if it did the splits . It was the king of all spiders and it had no rivals. The most interesting part, was that its teeth were now big enough to break skin and it decided to crawl onto my head. It bit through my skull and sunk its teeth into my brain. I saw lightning everywhere . . . i cant remember anything after that . i dont know where it went .
After more then five years of indecision, Dream Up The Words has finally been released. Most of the songs on this album have been done for a good 4 years , but a variety of issues stunted this album in a big way . Fallouts with “friends” , money issues , computer crashes and writers block all played into this story .
The first time i finished this album ( late 2006 ) , i stopped and told myself that i would make this album better then anything i’ve ever made . I really wanted to redo all the songs with a full band and give them a more human feel . That lead me to a good four years of just watching the demos collect dust . So 2011 hits and it finally becomes clear that i need to move on . So without further indecision , i give you Dream Up The Words , a monster , free from an old dark closet .
For a free download of Dream Up The Words , CLICK ME
I finally have a couple of updates for you.
First, i should let you all know that i haven’t been drumming with Room For A Ghost for quite some time. It seems like 6 months or longer. But it’s alright , we’ll probably continue writing and recording soon. Interestingly , I have since begun drumming for Monarchs who recently released a seven-inch record called polio, and i even more recently finished reinterpreting it. I was planning on having the remixes be a Monarchs release, but those dudes weren’t into them . So I’m probably going to put them on the Old And Gray Bandcamp Page soon . I just need to talk with their label and make sure he’s alright with that .
Secondly , I’m working on a song called “Forgiveness” for Jesse Dienner and its a whole lot of fun. I’ve been working on it for about 5 months and it has gone through a bunch of changes– mostly for the better…I think. I believe his plan is to release a cd with about 10 people’s versions of his song “Forgiveness”. They need to be done by the end of December so I have to hurry and redo the vocals and add the finishing touches. If anyone reads this in time, and wants to lend me their feedback/ or wants to come help sing the chorus parts . . . email me .
Lastly , i might start a new band with me good friend Ty from Northern Flickers. We’re looking for members, trying to figure out how to rule hard , and trying to pick a band name.
